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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLVII. No. 1215 



thrive in tlie medical school; there is no place 

 for it and the tendency in the modern medical 

 curriculum is to eliminate rather than to add 

 to the already over-crowded subject list. 

 Moreover, general physiology will find no 

 place, for the aspect of functional study is 

 from the top downward, from man towards 

 the lower groups; the cell will continue to be 

 treated as an interesting organ, even as the 

 liver is considered, but its study will progress 

 in the medical laboratories only so far as the 

 problems are of medical importance of a more 

 immediate nature. 



What, then, is to become of general, or 

 what we may term zoological, physiology, 

 granting that botanical physiology is in good 

 hands ? 



There are no agencies, save a very tew, 

 whereby a prospective student of zoological 

 physiology can gain the training necessary 

 for his work. "We must eliminate the medical 

 courses in physiology and in physiological 

 chemistry. Zoology must recognize the im- 

 portance of taking care of its own ground and 

 develop means of deriving a line of zoological 

 physiologists. It must cease to permit men 

 like our Gortners, McOlendons, Mathewses, 

 Lyons and others to be taken by the medical 

 and other professional schools from biology 

 into lines where their promises as students of 

 fundamentals cease. Unless this is done, the 

 considerate criticisms, such as the one we have 

 referred to at the beginning of the present 

 communication, that modern biology is in a 

 parlous way; that it is unproductive and deal- 

 ing with blue ethereal theories, and that its 

 face, which should be directed as that of 

 Janus, before and backward, is cast towards 

 the old, rather than the new. 



What the agencies must be which will be 

 capable of bringing biology into line with its 

 sister science, is a matter of lengthy discus- 

 sion. The conditions are ripe for the produc- 

 tion of a new order of work in dynamic biol- 

 ogy, for the methods which have been worked 

 out within recent years at the hands of Win- 

 terstein, Folin, Taschiro, Yan Slyke, and others 

 — the so-called " micro " methods applicable 

 to small material afiord an excellent place for 



beginning. Thus far the field is practically 

 virgin. From the investigation side, then, wo 

 are ready. From the pedagogical aspect, as 

 Mark Twain remarked about the weather, the 

 discussion is plentiful, but nothing is done; 

 zoologists want the development of more func- 

 tion, but they do not know what to do about 

 it. 'Not trained themselves to carry classes 

 in the subject, they are at a loss as to the 

 method of procedure. There is but one way : 

 Induce students entering biology to specialize 

 as best they may to fill positions in dynamic 

 biology and reward their efforts when they have 

 been successful by instructorships and higher 

 positions in their turn, in the departments of 

 zoology. This programme has been actually 

 put into force in one university. The great 

 desideratum, however, is that the opportunities 

 be more attractive than those offered by the 

 medical departments of physiology and bio- 

 chemistry." Otherwise the same gravitations 

 to these schools will take place as in the past. 

 It is not a matter of salary altogether; it is 

 mainly the creation of the appreciation for the 

 work of these students. Again, it is undesira- 

 ble that the studies should involve complicated 

 apparatus, unfamiliar and expensive chemi- 

 cals, etc. The simpler the more efiB.cient will 

 the work become. The plant physiological ap- 

 paratus and methods of men such as Professor 

 Genung are simple, inexpensive and readily 

 appreciated by the student; the same should 

 apply to general physiological methods and 

 apparatus. It is not necessary to measure the 

 hydrogen ion concentration in a class of this 

 nature, especially where it is desirable to do 

 so by complicated means, such as by a poten- 

 tiometer for E.M.F. In this one instance, we 

 have the extremely simple method, if it is nec- 

 essary at all to present the matter to a class 

 in functional zoology, of Marriott. Much 

 better than any, is to eliminate the methods 

 necessitating a fairly high degree of previous 

 experience in physics and chemistry; enough 

 will remain of fundamental importance which 

 may be studied by the microscope, the test- 

 tube and a few simple pieces of apparatus. 



2 The writer is using the words of the late Pro- 

 fessor F. P. Mall. 



